The definition of sovereignty is:

1. Supremacy of authority or rule as exercised by a sovereign or sovereign state.
2. Royal rank, authority, or power.
3. Complete independence and self-government.
4. A territory existing as an independent state.

The federal governments of Canada and the United States do pay lip service to the concept of Native sovereignty but that’s all it is.  During the Obama ’08 campaign… it was stated that:

SOVEREIGNTY, TRIBAL-FEDERAL RELATIONS AND THE TRUST RESPONSIBILITY:
Native American tribal nations are sovereign, self-governing political entities and enjoy a government-to-government relationship with the United States federal government that is recognized expressly in the U.S. Constitution.

Self-Determination: Barack Obama supports the principle of tribal self-determination, with recognition that the federal government must honor its treaty obligations and fully enable tribal self-governance.

But lip service is all it is.   For instance… if the Navajo Nation was allowed by the United States of America to regain complete and absolute sovereignty, the Dineh people would have the right to trade arms and missiles with North Korea, or buy/sell nuclear technology with Syria.  The Americans or Canadians simply wouldn’t allow a situation to exist where that situation was a possibility.  Can you imagine going to a currency exchange store and saying “I’d like three thousand Dineh Dollars please“… ??

The thing that makes the issue even more complicated is that international law is quite clearly on the same side as North America’s indigenous people.  The United Nations General Assembly clearly stated in the ‘Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples‘ that;

1. The subjection of peoples to alien subjugation, domination and exploitation constitutes a denial of fundamental human rights, is contrary to the Charter of the United Nations and is an impediment to the promotion of world peace and co-operation.
2. All peoples have the right to self-determination; by virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development.
3. Inadequacy of political, economic, social or educational preparedness should never serve as a pretext for delaying independence.
4. All armed action or repressive measures of all kinds directed against dependent peoples shall cease in order to enable them to exercise peacefully and freely their right to complete independence, and the integrity of their national territory shall be respected.

Is it no wonder that New Zealand, Australia, Canada and the United States – countries with significant indigenous populations – balked at signing that declaration?

I’m not sure I subscribe to the theory but there is a train of thought that in the modern world Native people in the United States should cease to view themselves as sovereign nations, and instead view themselves as self governing  American ‘states’ much like the 50 current states in the U.S.A.  Imagine… overnight, America’s state count exploding from 50 up to 614!

It sucks to say… but it may save native folk time and effort ceding sovereignty, and putting the issue to rest permanently so they can focus their energies towards other matters such as basic human rights.

Call me weird, and many people do but I read Ms. Blatchford’s column ( in Saturday November 14th edition)  Two standards of policing failed the residents of Caledonia and can only see a bias towards what she is comfortable with.  Why are so few people not able to step back and ask the questions of the non-residents of Six Nations, who over the years have constantly encroached on territory that did not belong to them, where is the protection for the citizens of Six Nations or any of our Indigenous nations?

Ms. Blatchford writes;

“..Not mentioned was the fact that by this time, Mr. Brown and his family had been living under this state-condoned oppression for three months, had been driven nearly mad by the threatening conduct of the natives, and had been left enraged and bewildered that the OPP and the government regularly turned a blind eye to it all….”

And in the last paragraph Ms. Blatchford writes

“…Insp. Haggith arrived to see the cameraman with his bloodied face and heard from spectators what had happened.

The turning point came when he overheard a woman talking on the phone to a police dispatcher, saying she wouldn’t give her name because she was afraid. “The police won’t do anything,” the woman said, “Who is going to help us?”

It was, he said, “a perception I could share.”…”

But that is my question as a Salteaux/Sioux (and maybe a little Cree too ;O) woman…who is protecting us?  Who protects our land from non-residents or citizens that just take chunks of it and assume ownership, sell, and or/develop.  Why is it that we live in a society where it is easy to forget we exist unless it’s to put us on display as a cultural showcase for Canada? I just don’t get it? Why is it that the Indigenous people with signed Treaties must in the year 2009 fight through the long laborious process of proving those same documents are legitimate? Not to mention our nations must use borrowed government money to pay the researchers and legal fees and pay it back from any future settlement money.

Mr. Brown and his family were living under state-condoned oppression for three months and are suing everybody and their uncle cause it was a horrible and they were driven “nearly mad” by the experience.  Ok I can believe that living under oppression in bad – I think we as Indigenous people can say we know this to be true. Back to my first sentence – two wrongs don’t make it right. But why the empathy for the Browns and not the people of Six who have been living under state-condoned oppression for centuries? Why it is easy for the Blatchford’s of the world to not like the condition when it happens to one of them but believe it only appropriate for the Indigenous people of Canada?

Where the heck is our protection from this horrible society that surrounds us? Do you ever read the comment sections after one of these stories? These are our neighbours, bosses, co-workers that manage to say and do the most hurtful statements and make disgusting accusations not acceptable anywhere else. I confess I really don’t like a lot of people and even more …strangers really scare me.

With every ounce of honesty in me I read those comments and imagine they are written by everyone I see in my day. I believe they are written by the persons who sits on the bus next to me, strangers on the street who stare, and even people in my gym class. It’s easy to believe that any and most  of the people whose path I cross hate my guts, believe I am a lazy alcoholic just waiting to suck every tax dollar out of them, and think I am ‘slow’ but that would be the easy way out.

It’s easy to hate and get angry – it takes effort to find solutions.  And that explains a lot about the majority society and the people who form it. I don’t want to be like them.

The first one is a rant from an out of touch ‘Metis’ idiot which helps to prove my point that Metis people have no concept of life for aboriginal people in Canada.

The second video speaks for itself – it made me laugh till it hurt the first time I watched it.

The third video is what I consider to be justice, and a righteous decision against Manitoban Metis who are putting forth an unbelievably ridiculous claim, which if it was approved would once again end up leaving First Nation people with the short end of the stick.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

I wasn’t allowed to work for the first 3 years so I spent quite a long time simply driving around Kenora doing nothing in particular.  After hearing a few more stories about police brutality in town, I started following Kenora Police Service cruisers around town.  I’d never get in their way because obviously that would be obstructing justice, but it isn’t illegal either so I did it for a long while… at least 8 months or more.  Quite often I’d be following a cruiser around downtown and they’d all of a sudden speed off on a call with their lights flashing and sirens blaring.  Obviously I couldn’t follow at their speed so I’d make educated guesses as to their destination and got it right almost every time – either Minto Ave, Minto Bay, Minto Crescent or Cambrian Drive.  In these areas there’s a high concentration of Aboriginal people living.  Quite often I’d be parked a hundred feet away from the police cruiser, with my lights off simply observing and watching.

I never witnessed outright police brutality but many times saw the offensive attitudes of officers getting up in people’s faces, pushing and shoving handcuffed people necessarily, and generally how brusque and rude the officers were when dealing with aboriginal people.  Race relations and equality between the police in Kenora and Aboriginal people is very bad, and in dire need of someone to fix it.  Practically every Aboriginal person I know has a tale to tell of unpleasant dealings between Kenora Police Service and an Aboriginal person.

For instance on one occasion, a physically big and strong Aboriginal guy I know was at Shooter’s bar quite intoxicated.  After getting out of the bar, the police were dealing with him for some reason I cannot recall.  Being intoxicated, he was getting quite belligerent and resisting the officers who were trying to take him to the drunk tank.  Eventually it took four officers to put on handcuffs.  He was put into a cruiser and driven to the area between Home Hardware and the baseball field opposite A&W fast food restaurant.  The four officers, one of whom was a female officer, dragged him out of the cruiser and proceeded to beat and stomp him silly for about ten minutes.  Whilst he deserved to go to jail for being drunk and disorderly in public, that didn’t give the police the right to throw him to the ground with his hands cuffed behind his back and beat him with their nightsticks and kick him in the face repeatedly.  That’s not a rumour – that happened.

Another example of police brutality towards Aboriginal people was the case of a teenage girl, whose grandfather is the recently retired Justice of the Peace Joe Morrison.  The girl was picked up by Kenora Police Service for being intoxicated in public and was taken back to the cells at KPS.  The girl was of slight stature… less than 120lbs.  One of the officers at the KPS HQ who outweighed her by at least 50lbs went into her cell and proceeded to beat the daylights out of her.  The idiot forgot to search her before putting her in the cell.  The victim pulled out her cellular telephone and called her grandpa Joe Morrison, who immediately came to KPS on a rampage.  Being a Ontario Court Justice, he had a lot of sway and got his granddaughter released immediately.

Then obviously there’s the case of Max Kakegamic, an Aboriginal man from North Spirit Lake who was murdered by an officially unknown suspect.  You can read about the story from a CTV interview with the main suspect Justin Carambetsos, who whines about being afraid to walk the streets in Kenora.  In a nutshell, the Kenora Police service were found to have lied under oath and obstructed justice, which resulted in the investigation into Justin Carambetsos being dropped.  He subsequently started legal action against Kenora Police Service for $5million.   The KPS officers who were found guilty of witholding evidence by the Board were not prosecuted for that crime – one resigned, and the other was demoted.  It’s a glaring example of the inequalities of the judicial system in Kenora.

The officer who brought the misconduct of Officer’s White and Favreau to light was Deputy Police Chief Dan Jorgensen.  After Chief Curtis retired, Dan Jorgensen became Chief of Police and since then has made a huge effort to improve relations with Aboriginal people in Kenora.  There are still many blatantly racist and predjudice officers working for Kenora Police Service, and it will take a long time to weed that out.  But unfortunately that might never happen because Kenora Police Service is due to be disbanded in favour of the Ontario Provincial Police.  All of KPS officers will still be policing Kenora as OPP – the difference is there won’t be an officer in command of them who is dedicated to erasing racism from the police and improving Aboriginal relations in Kenora.  Without Dan at the helm, these same racist KPS officers will still be strutting around on power trips with attitudes to match, making life hell for any Aboriginal person in Kenora unlucky enough to get in their crosshairs.  It really sucks because there are one or two front-line officers who aren’t racist, who are approachable, and don’t have bad attitudes, but it seems that they are in the minority in Kenora at present.

The only way that could ever begin to change is if more Aboriginal people desired to become police officers and joined the Ontario Provincial Police (if it gets the contract for policing in Kenora).  The other way that could change is with a police force specifically for the Aboriginal community, but as that isn’t going too well at present because of a mixture of racist caucasian officers and ass-backwards management.

Logic states that the more Aboriginal people in uniform, the less incidents of brutality towards Aboriginal people will be seen.  Let’s hope that happens one day in the near future.

Obviously I can understand why T3PS would be an equal opportunities employer – in theory, any non-aboriginal officer should be able to perform the duties of an aboriginal police force as well as any aboriginal officer.

But in practice that just isn’t happening. I know a few individuals who have the opportunity of dealing with T3PS and aboriginal people on a daily basis. A few years ago, in the back lane going from Movie Gallery all the way to Real Canadian Wholesale, I remember seeing an intoxicated aboriginal person lying underneath a tree. Through faltering conversation I learned that that individual had just been picked up by caucasian Treaty 3 officers who had beaten the daylights out of him, which was evident by the bleeding lip and bruises on his face.

Being naive I didn’t believe him, thinking it was just another drunken mistake. But then I started hearing more of the same kind of stories from someone who works for the Street Patrol.

The problem is the Chief of Police Brian Rupert – an incompetent manager trying to act like he’s aboriginal. In my book, a Status Card doesn’t necessarily make someone Aboriginal.  There’s plenty of caucasian people in Canada who have full Indian status, which proves my point.  A Status Card just illustrates the category the Federal government puts a person in. The reason why this matters is an Aboriginal person who had lived amongst the people would have a far better understanding of the lives and problems people in Treaty #3 area face.

His hiring policies claim to have 75% of officers with Aboriginal ancestry – obviously he’s including Metis people in that (who will never be Aboriginal regardless of what the Federal Government says). I’m not sure where he gets the 75% from but after speaking to people who were on the police board, and others who deal daily with T3PS, I’d noticed from the officers seen cruising around, 75% was correct – but aimed at the wrong portion. 75% were non-aboriginal. Once in a blue moon would I see an Aboriginal officer in the T3PS uniform. I’d also learned that native folk were getting turned away by the dozens, whilst white officers kept getting hired. I’m friends with some officers from Treaty 3 Police, and the ones I know are decent coppers.

I’ve noticed an overall lack of competency compared with the OPP or KPS. The problem is Rupert’s hiring of rookie caucasian officers fresh out of police college mostly with big attitude problems and chips on their shoulders. These younger caucasian officers are the jock types in highschool that either bullied people are didn’t socialise with native folk. Put them in a uniform, with a gun and authority and it goes to their heads.

Only twice in nearly seven years have I seen T3PS pull over a vehicle for any reason. One time when a member of my son’s family was cruising at 140kmh a T3PS copper pulled them over, told them to slow down, turned around and drove off. Any other police force and that person would have been given a hefty fine.

Numerous times myself I’ve been speeding well over the limit, and saw T3PS coming the opposite way. I never bother to slow down because I know they’ll never pull me over. T3PS officers are sworn for all of Ontario just as any other police officer in Ontario. Their mandate is Treaty 3, but they have a duty to pull over people speeding or committing other offences – but they don’t.

Police officers are supposed to command respect and exude authority – T3PS do nothing to gain that respect. So is it any wonder any time there’s a MAJOR crime within their jurisdiction they call in the OPP, whilst T3PS officers are left to direct traffic?  I don’t blame any of this one the officers on patrol – as I’ve said numerous times, the ones I know are splendid – I pick my children up from the same daycare as some of T3PS officers – and they’re good people trying to do a job without all the necessary components, but are held back by poor management.

Luckily Rupert is about to retire… so hopefully they’ll get someone more competent to replace him. He would have been better simply sticking to law enforcement with the Ontario Provincial Police.

The next in line is Louis Napish, who I am told (from a very reliable source) is a good guy, and good at what he does.  The fact that he speaks Anishinaabe is a big plus for a variety of reasons, one of them being it demonstrates that he is an integral part of Anishinaabe culture, instead of just paying lip service by having a Status Card. One day T3PS might actually start to give preference to First Nations people. Time will tell.

The bravery shown by this man defending a freedom, that as an Aboriginal man, he would never receive from Canada is flabbergasting.  It is completely beyond my personal comprehension how a Native man in Canada could do this much for a country that treated him as a second-class citizen.  I’m glad he did, as should every freedom loving person in Canada – I’m only sad that he died before I was born and I never had the privilege of meeting him.

.

It’s not about the blood quantum – it is entirely about a made-up culture from a bunch of people who have a very serious identity crisis in wanting to be Aboriginal. As far as I am concerned, and a LOT of Aboriginal people in Canada, they never will be regardless of what the government says.

Most people know the history of where Metis people came from, and that might have been true 100-200 years ago – but the Metis people back then were genuine half-breeds (50% native blood). The Metis people that exist today are plainly white people trying to swindle the government out of money, and take away from government funding for First Nation people.

One of the sources of resentment First Nation people I have spoken to have that various sources of funding from the government for things like dental care, prescription costs, etc are getting progressively smaller because the misguided government is including ‘Metis’ people in that funding.

An example of Metis people screwing things up for First Nation people: there’s a medical centre called Kenora Area Health Access Centre which is based on Washagamis Bay First Nation just outside of Kenora. It was set up to cater specifically for the medical needs of First Nation people. One of the services it provides is sending Nurse Practitioners out to the reserves it services to provide a clinic for people with ailments. This service is sorely needed because many of the people on the reserves cannot just make trips to Washagamis Bay for appointments. However, the Executive Director Anita Cameron decided to open up a drop-in clinic right in the centre of town, and scale back the service to the reserves. I have it on good advice that it all down to her desire of ‘pan-aboriginal care’ in which she is including Metis people in Kenora. So Metis people in Kenora can drop into the KAHAC office by the Shell gas station and get medical care, instead of taking themselves to the hospital like every other non-aboriginal person.

So the less mobile people on the reserves, and people without ways to get to a service centre have to deal with a far less frequent visit from KAHAC.

Incidently… Anita Cameron is also the person who wanted to pay a newly hired Caucasian Nurse Practitioner about 30% more than the Aboriginal Nurse Practitioners, just so her paycheque after tax deductions equaled what the Aboriginal Nurse Practitioners received without tax deductions.

The point is Metis people and the vast majority of non-aboriginal people in Canada have very little or no understanding at all of the issues facing Aboriginal people in this country, and for a group of white people masquerading as Aboriginal is a slight to every First Nation person in Canada.

All over Canada, Metis people overall have a far higher living standard than First Nation people, and yet still want to take from Natives.

According to the ‘Self Sufficiency’ paragraph on this website, Metis people do not seek a ‘handout’ from any level of government. Yet according to this news story, Ontario Metis want cut of province’s gaming revenue. They don’t seek a handout, or they want gaming revenue? Metis people do not need gaming revenue. First Nation people do!

If it were up to me, regardless of what anyone said, I would let Metis people make their Metis cards, and identify as Metis, and have their little groups of white people jigging to non-native music… but I would not give them a single cent of government funding for anything, I would completely remove all rights to any natural resource and remove them from the definition of Aboriginal in Canada.

The affects of sexual abuse and colonisation on people are well documented and easy for anyone to research.  But the affects of colonisation on Australia’s Aboriginal people and communities are far beyond what I ever imagined.

And for once, I don’t have an idea or opinion on how I would fix it.

Take a good read through this article entitled ‘Culture of Denial‘ on The Australian website.  It’s enough to shock anyone.

More than most (because of the time I’ve taken to learn, that others haven’t) I’m aware of what it’s like for Aboriginal people in Canada.

I thought I’d seen some really bad stuff here in Canada… until I read this post about an Australian minister who wants to clear remote communities and force Australia’s remote Aboriginal communities to move into built up areas.

Mr Johns says the Government should rewrite welfare rules permanently to force Aborigines to move out of remote areas.

A blatant call to further destroy a traditional indigenous way of life, and further colonise a people.  To most decent people it’s shocking.  What’s even more shocking is this kind of mentality and train of thought is very common amongst Australians and their government.